Private social intranet service protects SMB's business information while improving productivity by up to one full workday

LOS ANGELES, Calif; MALMO, Sweden, May 19, 2014-- Incentive, a private social intranet service that protects an SMB's business information while improving productivity, today announced it has launched in the U.S. with a new office and $1.8M in funding. Incentive chose to turn to angel investors in this round of financing, which will be used to strengthen relationships with its growing base of U.S. customers and help new customers discover a more secure, smart and fast way to get work done.

“Incentive’s social intranet service is built for the modern business, bringing all the communication channels of a company together in a single, elegantly designed, easy-to-use offering that protects the knowledge within your company,” said Rickard Hansson, founder and CEO of Incentive. “With our suite of social collaboration tools, companies know exactly where their data is, instead of having it be managed in a public cloud. Employees can discover information significantly faster often saving an entire work day per employee per week. That means less time wasted looking for information and more time to get work done.”

According to a McKinsey study, organizations can achieve up to 20-25% increase in the productivity of knowledge workers using social technologies.

Incentive is an all-in-one, downloadable software suite with activity streams, wikis, blogs, and apps that is hosted securely behind a firewall or in a company’s private cloud. It links information to the creator so the entire team can see who is an expert in different areas. A Google-like search box lets organizations identify valuable knowledge centers within the company, organize groups, projects, subjects, and departments and share activity streams via wikis and blogs for better and richer engagement with source experts within a company -- all in a safe and secure environment.

The company was founded in 2008 in Malmo, Sweden, and continues to be one of the only intranet software providers that can offer airtight data privacy and protection of a company’s critical business information. Installation happens behind the firewall or on a secure private cloud. Even employees at Incentive don't have access to the critical business data that its customers manage with their service, which makes it the perfect tool not only for businesses but also for government bodies with high demands for privacy and security. Incentive is also offered as a hosted service (SaaS) for those who do no have an infrastructure or a private cloud.

"In the past 25 years, I've successfully grown Swedish companies from their startup phase to IPO, including QlikTech and Axis Communications, and built their awareness in the U.S.," said Semmy Rülf, investor and board chairman at Incentive. "Incentive has an exciting opportunity to be a market leader where small to medium sized companies want to benefit from all that a social intranet has to offer, but are wary of exposing critical information to the cloud. With the new round of funding, Incentive can keep building its world-class team, product and attract attention in the U.S."

Incentive plans to double its sales force in the U.S., as well as the development team in Sweden during the course of this year. It is also in advanced talks with well-known U.S. companies, government and defense organizations that require a social intranet that offers the level of privacy that Incentive provides.

About Incentive:

Incentive is a private social intranet for SMBs that integrates a company’s formal knowledge with their people’s informal knowledge. Every aspect of their business is available in one, secure place, and accessible by everyone in the organization. On average, employees spend an entire day per week looking for information.

Using Incentive’s social intranet means that all knowledge about a company, shared by the employees of the business, stays within the company and resides in one place. That means less time is wasted looking for information and more time is gained to get work done. The company has headquarters in Malmo, Sweden and Los Angeles, CA. Learn more at www.incentivecorp.com.